The Corner Office

The first time I was considered for a CEO position I actually got the job, which surprised the heck out of me. When I asked the executive recruiter why I was chosen over what I thought were more experienced candidates, one of the things he said was that I had “CEO presence.”

Admittedly, I’m not 100 percent sure what that means. But I have worked with hundreds of CEOs and other executives, so I thought I’d take a stab at what constitutes “executive presence.” Whenever I attempt this sort of thing, the results are often counterintuitive, if not downright surprising. This is no exception.

One conclusion is that executive presence has nothing to do with polish, poise, sophistication, or even use of body language and gestures. In my opinion, executives with presence are just as likely to not posses those qualities. In this day and age, executive presence comes in lots of shapes and sizes, including some you wouldn’t intuitively recognize. 30 years ago, who would have thought a nerd like Bill Gates could have executive presence? But he does.

Another conclusion some may have a tough time swallowing: I don’t think any of these qualities are easy to learn or practice. I’m sure you can cognitively develop and improve some of them, but not by much. Not that anyone’s born with them; they develop over time with experience and maturity. (more…)

Last weekend I faced moral fear. It was me and a chainsaw against a two foot diameter, 80 foot high oak tree. According to OSHA, “More people are killed while felling trees than during any other logging activity.” Reading that didn’t help. I’d never felled a tree before. I was terrified.

Sure, I took all the necessary precautions, but still, one kick from I don’t know how many tons of dense wood, one stumble over some twigs and brush during retreat, one kick of a pinched chainsaw, and it could have been all over. But I did it. And it was exhilarating. 

I felled that tree in a day. But you know what? I spent decades agonizing over career changes, business challenges, public speeches, being interviewed on live television. That fear was somehow harder to face than slicing through a five or ten ton tree with a chainsaw, not knowing exactly what it would do when I finished the final cut.

If your current job is all you aspire to, all you’re passionate about, all you’ve spent your life dreaming about, then great, you’ve hit the jackpot. Have a happy life and don’t look back. If, on the other hand, you feel unfulfilled much of the time, if you wake up in the morning and go to bed at night feeling like there’s got to be more to this life, then something’s holding you back. (more…)

It’s relatively easy to be a successful child. All you’ve got to do is learn how to be cute, get attention, and cry when you’re hurt or hungry. Learning how to be a teenager is much harder; I’m not sure anybody’s good at it. I certainly wasn’t. As for becoming an adult, I’ve been working on that for decades and making very, very slow progress.

Everything gets harder as you get older, and becoming a good manager is no exception.

In fact, becoming a good manager is harder than all of those other phases combined. Why? Because, it not only depends on how much of an adult you’ve become, but how adult your employees are. Not to mention all the management and leadership skills that so-called experts and gurus aren’t even sure about - they debate this stuff all the time.

So, for all you relatively new, aspiring managers, and for those supposedly seasoned veterans who are honest enough with themselves to admit that they’re still trying to figure it out, here are three relatively critical but not necessarily intuitive tips I’ve learned by trial and lots of error along the way.

Try to act like a mature adult. As I alluded to above, the best managers are those rare individuals who actually behave like mature adults. What does that mean? It means being as honest, comfortable, and empathetic with your own issues and shortcomings as you are with your strengths and skills. Only then can you do the same for others, and that’s what good managers do. (more…)

As an early adopter of WebEx (now owned by Cisco) about a decade ago, I grappled with the unique challenges of presenting without being able to visually connect with your audience. Training, virtual, sales, multinational, board of directors, webinars, more and more meetings are done via the Web. So when I received an email (excerpted below) from a reader the other day, it got my attention:

My normal presentation venue is an online meeting without video conferencing - other than PowerPoint and screen sharing. While reading your post, How to Give a Killer Presentation, I kept thinking about the difficult challenges online meetings present such as the inability to read body language, not knowing when participants are having side conversations, and all the associated challenges that arise when you cannot see and visually interact with your audience.

So, do you have advice for giving killer online presentations using service providers such at GoToMeeting and WebEx?  

Jerry Anderson

I sure do. Here are 7 Tips for Giving a Killer Online Presentation: (more…)

It’s a fact of business life: almost every day we’re asked to tell our or our company’s story. CEO, HR consultant, small business owner, B2B marketer, VP of whatever, it doesn’t matter who you are or what you do. Today or tomorrow you’ll be standing next to someone - at a conference, in the hallway, in a customer meeting, at the supermarket - and that person will ask, “So, what do you do?” or “What does your company do?” And that person could be important to you; you never know.

But I do know that, if you want to be successful in business, you have to know how to tell your story so it resonates with whoever you’re telling it to. As an interview skill, it goes without (more…)

The Corner Office’s most popular post - How to Give a Killer Presentation - said it best:

It’s hard to imagine your career going anywhere unless you can deliver an effective presentation. Unfortunately, most of us are born without the presentation gene. I have no idea why, but for most professionals, presenting is a real struggle.

They stand there, like they’re glued to the floor, with their 90-slide presentation with a dozen bullets and sub-bullets and a book of text on each slide. Then they complain that executives and salespeople make all the money.

For better or worse, most companies use PowerPoint, and in my experience, most managers and executives have no idea how to use effectively. It’s just as important as present skills, and if you follow these tips, you’ll wow your audience instead of confusing and boring them: (more…)

There’ve been quite a few BNET posts on how to present, speak, and email. There’s Speak Like Obama, Write Powerful Emails, even How to Give a Killer Presentation (yes, I wrote that one). Remember the old proverb: “Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime?” Well, it’s the same with business communications.

There are underlying principles that are common to all modes of business communications. Unfortunately, they don’t teach you this stuff in business school; I learned by observing dozens of CEOs and other executives. And over two decades, I developed my own set of principles.

(more…)

For all the marketers out there, I feel your pain. There’s nothing more challenging and discouraging than getting senior management to buy into your ideas. But take heart. I’ve gone up against some of the smartest, toughest, nastiest, marketing-distrusting CEOs, boards, CFOs, and GMs you’ve ever seen.

One particular executive staff meeting (at a Fortune 1000 company) sticks in my mind. The product division VP went on an emotionally-charged, 20 minute filibustering rant because he thought every penny of a $50 million marketing budget should be spent promoting his products. In the same meeting, the VP of worldwide manufacturing asked, “why do we even need this promotion stuff?”

It isn’t always pretty, but those are the meetings that thicken your skin and help you hone your skills.

I don’t care if you’re pitching an executive level strategic planning process, a worldwide product launch, a corporate-wide CRM project, a branding strategy, a new product line, or an enhanced PR program. These five tips will help you break down the “resistance to marketing” brick wall.

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It’s hard to imagine your career going anywhere unless you can deliver an effective presentation. Unfortunately, most of us are born without the presentation gene. I have no idea why, but for most professionals, presenting is a real struggle.

They stand there, like they’re glued to the floor, with their 90-slide presentation with a dozen bullets and sub-bullets and a book of text on each slide. Then they complain that executives and salespeople make all the money.

I’ve sat through presentations that were so bad I wanted to strangle the guy just to put him and the audience out of their misery. I’ve also seen presentations that were so inspiring they changed my life.

Connecting with an audience, communicating your vision and passion for a subject, can be a beautiful experience. It’s also a rare opportunity to make an impression that might impact your future. It can either be a gateway or a roadblock to professional growth. Which one is entirely up to you.

As for me, I’ve been professionally trained, plus I’ve had a few decades of practice. Here’s what I’ve learned.

Ten Rules For Delivering a Great Presentation

• Developing the pitch. Start with your main point of view and a handful of take-aways. Then build a storyboard around that, one slide per thought. Keep the number of slides down and allow a few minutes per slide.  
• The icebreaker. Start with something to break the tension (yours and theirs): a welcome gesture, engaging or humorous anecdote, graphic or video, or some combination. Keep it relevant and appropriate. Don’t tell a joke.  
• The old axiom. Old advice, but it works: First tell the audience what you’re going to tell them, then tell them, then tell them what you told them.
• Don’t read what’s on the slide. Know the pitch cold (without having to look except for a brief cue) and speak in your own words. If you (rarely) want the audience to read what’s on a slide, look at it and read silently along with them.
• Engage the audience. Ask questions. If they don’t respond, try offering an answer and asking for a show of hands or ask easier questions. Make the audience part of the experience.
• Be accessible. Don’t stand behind a podium. Use a wireless mic if needed. Get close to the audience and move from place to place while maintaining eye contact, but only from time to time. Do not bounce around like a ping-pong ball.
• Pause for effect and emphasis. Practice being comfortable with silence for two or three seconds. It’s the most dramatic way to make a point. Avoid ahs, uhs, and other fillers of uncomfortable silence; they’re annoying and detract from your presence.
• Make eye contact. But only for a few seconds per person. Too short and you’ll fail to engage; too long and it becomes uncomfortable. Don’t bounce your eyes around constantly.
• Use hand gestures. They’re engaging and interesting. But when you’re not, keep your hands at your sides. Don’t fidget, hold onto things, or put your hands in front of you, behind you, or in your pockets. Avoid nervous habits.
• Don’t block the audience’s view. Don’t step in front of the screen or block it from view, except for the occasional walk-across. Gesture with your hand, but don’t touch the screen. Don’t use a pointer unless you must.

Remember, you weren’t born with this ability; it takes practice. Videotape yourself presenting to an empty conference room or get someone with experience to watch you and provide feedback. If your company hires a speech coach for executives and up-and-comers, get in on it.

Most importantly, be patient with yourself. Finding your own style where you feel comfortable comes with experience. It may take a few years, but it’s worth it. Nothing can boost your career like being able to give a killer pitch.